study on relationships between yield and its components in iranian cantaloupe genotypes

study on relationships between yield and its components will improve the efficiencyof a breeding program with appropriate selection criteria. in this study,interrelationships between yield and its components in cantaloupe were investigatedusing sequential path coefficient analysis. to determine important components of yieldin cantaloupe, 49 genotypes generated from 7 × 7 diallel, were evaluated in α-latticedesign with 3 replications. the highest coefficient correlation was obtained betweenfruit weight and fruit number with yield. sequential stepwise multiple regressionanalysis was performed to organize the predictor variables into first, second and thirdorder paths based on their respective contributions to the total variation of yield andminimum collinearity. based on the variance inflation factor and magnitude of directeffects, average of fruits weight and number of fruit per plant were considered as firstorder variables and accounted for 96 percent of total variation of yield. the t-test ofsignificance, using standard error values, obtained through bootstrap resampling,indicating that all direct effects were significant. the results also indicated that both twotraits of average of fruits weight and number of fruit per plant could be considered asselection criterion in selecting for increased yield in cantaloupe.